Tag Archives: lucic

Mondays suck a lot less when you have the Bruins on at night. It’s going to be a big game for sure, and the Bruins must be pumped to play at the Garden again. The last time we came home for game 3 of the finals, we beat the Canucks 8 to 1. That would be amazing to do again, obviously.

Adam McQuaid told espn that “You run on adrenaline this time of year”, and it’s true. After playing as many games as these guys have, they need every little bit of help they can get. So if you’re going to the game and don’t plan on screaming your heart out, then give the tickets to someone else (preferably me). Let’s just hope the series doesn’t flip flop like the NBA is, and go back and forth. We need to take these two at home! Go Bruins!

I don’t want to jinx anything, but here are a few things that could be in our favor (from ESPN):

The Bruins will take on the 2-2 Carolina Hurricanes tonight at 7. The Bruins are looking to improve to 4-0-1 on the season. Both teams have scored 2.75 goals per game, while the Bruins have only allowed 2 per game, compared to the 3.25 that the Hurricanes have allowed. However, we only average 29 shots per game, where they average 39. This is better for our percentages, but tough when we have Anton Khudobin making his first start of the season. He started one game for us last season and only allowed 1 goal while recording 44 saves. He has only played in 7 career games.

Gregory Cambell, David Krejci, Milan Lucic, Brad Marchand, and Rookie Dougie Hamilton are all tied for the team lead with 3 points. Lucic is the leader with 3 goals and penalty minutes with 17. This fits right in with the Bruins model ever since the won the Cup 2 years ago. There is no clear-cut star on this season. It could have been Savard before he got concussed, but now there is no one. Just a team that’s willing to do whatever it takes to get the W. I love that hockey’s back.

Not much good news in the NHL this season, but there is one thing that Bruin’s fans can be happy about. Nathan Horton is now healthy and will play if and when the season starts. He last played on January 22nd after his 2nd concussion in just 7 months. His first concussion came against the Canucks in the 2011 Stanley Cup Finals. He scored 17 goals and had 15 assists last season before getting sidelined in January.

This will be big for the Bruins who struggled to score at the end of last season. Horton is a proven scorer with a 30+ goal season and many 20+ goal seasons. Can’t wait for the black and gold to get started again.

Not the kind of weekend we’d hope for in Boston, but exciting nonetheless. And by exciting, I mean just the Bruins. Let’s just say the Celtics game was slightly less than exhilarating Friday night. It’s kind of hard to win when you only score 25 points in the first half. You just can’t put up those kinds of numbers expect to win, even when it’s the Pacers, regardless of their decent start to the season. This time we can’t even put the blame on the defense. The Pacers put up 87 points and still managed to win by 15 points. Pretty pathetic on the Celts part. Hopefully they can get back on their feet against a struggling Dallas team before they head into a pretty tough run to close out January. As far as the Bruins are concerned, what a game. I mean if you’re looking for intensity, Saturday’s Stanly Cup rematch against the Canucks was just about as intense as it gets. It felt like playoff hockey came 5 months early. Again, I’m not concerned about the loss at all. It sucks we couldn’t beat them, but in the end the game was not all that important in the long run. We’re the ones with the Cup. Not to mention we played pretty much the whole game without Lucic and ended up losing Marchand down the stretch, both to game misconducts. What concerns me is the pending suspensions both, especially Marchand, may be facing. I have a feeling Lucic’s won’t be terrible, if anything, but Marchand’s may be a while. Canuck’s head coach Alain Vigneault said, “Marchand — this is just my feeling on this — some day he’s going to get it.” At the time it turned the garden electric, but looking back it was a foolish move and arguably cost the B’s the game. The Canucks scored twice in the 5 minute major that followed Marchand’s hit. Either way, what do you guys think? With the intensity of the game was the hit just or did Marchand let emotions get the best of him?

Heading into tonight’s matchup against the Sabres, the only thing that the Bruins are concerned about is stretching their win streak to 10 games and claiming first place in the Northeast Division. The Sabres may have something else in mind. Retaliation. At least that’s what the media is building it up to be, and it could end up helping the B’s. The hit that Lucic put on Miller only eleven days ago is still fresh in everyone’s mind. A controversial hit like that always leads to this sort of hype before the next time the teams meet, but the Bruins are focused on the greater goal at hand. “It’s not like you can just go out there and be stupid,” Ference said Monday. “We were in a similar situation obviously with the Cooke thing. If they want to get goofy then that’s fine. Our team is well equipped for different kinds of games.” The Bruins are ready to play hockey, whether that means reacting to Buffalo vengeance or not. If the Sabres go head hunting tonight, you can bet the house that the B’s will be ready.

This whole Lucic thing from the other night is killin’ me. I follow hockey and am a huge Bruins fan, but basketball is definitely my “go-to” winter sport. So stop me if I’m wrong, but don’t hockey players pride themselves in how much tougher they are than any other athlete? Although not how I’d state it, I definitely do respect hockey players for that aspect of the game. That being said, how can Ryan Miller come out and complain about a hit that resulted in a minor penalty. Did he think he could come about 20 feet out of the net to try and stop a Lucic breakaway without suffering the consequences? I love the mentality of playing tough and physical in any sport if you want to win. Since Miller came well out of his crease to play the puck like a defender, he’s going to get treated like a defender, especially with the Looch coming at you. Anyways, Lucic has a hearing with the NHL today at 1pm to determine if they’ll be any consequences for the hit. With the NFL implementing all these new hitting rules, I’ll be disappointed in the NHL as well if they make a big deal out of this. Never more fitting than in this situation…It’s just part of the game. NO EASY BUCKETS!